


Dreamless

by regentzilla



Category: Metal Gear
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-03
Updated: 2015-03-03
Packaged: 2018-03-16 02:28:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3470990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/regentzilla/pseuds/regentzilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The drone of the Nomad's engines is comforting, in a way, a hum and vibration that makes the stillness and silence of dialysis feel a little less stifling. Raiden is just a few breaths away from sleep when a nearby muffled cough sends a jolt down his spine, and suddenly his entire body is back to being alert and tingling.</p><p>(<a href="https://ficbook.net/readfic/4187460">Translated into Russian by SinkingSea!</a>)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dreamless

The drone of the Nomad's engines is comforting, in a way, a hum and vibration that makes the stillness and silence of dialysis feel a little less stifling. It's a white noise that makes it easy to zone out, to stop running through events and reanalyzing and second-guessing.

He's just a few breaths away from sleep when a nearby muffled cough sends a jolt down his spine, and suddenly his entire body is back to being alert and tingling. It's a reflex that isn't entirely his.

“Snake,” he says, without opening his eyes.

He gets a wet grumble in response and Snake forgoes stealth for the last few steps across the room. “Didn't want to wake you up,” Snake mutters, settling to sit near Raiden's feet.

“Wasn't sleeping,” Raiden replies, shifting slightly and feeling the plugs along his back strain gently as the motion tugs at them. “Don't sleep much at all anymore.”

Snake growls, a garbled hum of acknowledgement, and Raiden hears the faint click of clipped fingernails against a lighter. “No smoking,” he admonishes gently.

“Kids these days,” Snake says, but he slips the lighter back into his pocket.

“Sunny and Otacon are right about smoking, you know,” Raiden says, opening his eyes just slightly. Snake is sitting at the foot of the dialysis bed, arms crossed over his broad chest, unabashedly taking in the sight of Raiden's body. It's exciting for a moment before Raiden remembers he's a broken machine. Damaged goods. There's no arousal in Snake's gaze but Raiden tries to latch onto the fact that there isn't condemnation or disgust either.

“No point in quitting now,” Snake says, looking away.

Again Raiden shifts uncomfortable, tugging harder at the restraining tubes this time. “I used to smoke, you know.” Back in the peak of his tryhard days, not that he's out of those particular woods yet. “If I can kick the habit I'm sure you can.”

“You had your youth. You still have it.”

Raiden breathes out a dry laugh that whistles between his front teeth and lower lip— he can't recall if he's had any practice laughing at all, sarcastic or not, with his half-new mouth. “If I get out of this hellhole alive I'll have it longer than I want it.”

Snake knows better than to say he's jealous but Raiden can see it, and more than a few other bitten-back comments, in his creased face.

“Age isn't everything,” Raiden says tersely. “Being young isn't everything.”

Snake grumbles. He's clearly unconvinced.

“There's two sides to youth, just like anything else,” hisses Raiden, frustration boiling in his stomach. “It's not just about looks and health! It's inexperience. It's not knowing yourself, it's wanting to be someone, anyone, and having no idea who you have the potential to be on your own. It's about— having that taken advantage of—”

He isn't done, far from it, but he's breathless, and he didn't realize he was straining to sit up until a combination of the dialysis plugs and Snake's hand on his chest snap him back to the table. He closes his eyes again and takes a shaky breath.

After a few moments, Snake hasn't moved his hand.

“I wanted to get older,” Raiden whines, fully aware that he sounds like an entitled child, but he can't be bothered to hold it in. “I wanted to be someone, I wanted children—” his voice breaks— “I just wanted to get old and demented and forget—”

“Kid!”

He opens his eyes, suddenly livid, and strains against Snake's hand. “Will you stop calling me that!”

A smile actually ghosts over Snake's face, the absolute bastard, Raiden can see it in the brief crinkle of his eyes and the way his moustache moves.

Snake starts to say something but chokes on it, doubles over with something wet and heavy lodged in his throat. Raiden wraps a hand around Snake's forearm, holding him up as best he can, claws digging hard into Snake's skin with every heavy cough and jolt. He finally gives in to the strain and buckles, sits next to Raiden, one hand in a fist in front of his mouth and the other tight against the ridges of Raiden's chest. Raiden's hand doesn't leave his arm.

In the faint grey light of the room, cast in uniform shadow, Snake looks very, very old. His skintone is sallow, speckled with liver spots, wrinkles cutting deep crags and valleys across his face. He looks tired and sick and sad.

Before the thought has time to germinate past an impulse, Raiden fists both hands in the front of Snake's tight shirt, claws snagging in the material, and yanks him down into a clumsy kiss.

Despite being unsure about the laughter, he's absolutely positive he's never kissed anyone in his new body, and it's a bizarre sensation. His lower lip stays in place as he pushes his mouth forward, firm and unfeeling, and his upper lip is buried in moustache, which is an entirely different kind of new and strange. Snake tastes like stale cigarettes, smoker's mucus and dry skin. Raiden's sure he doesn't taste any better— he remembers being disgusted by the prickly metal taste of his own mouth, before he stopped noticing it altogether— but Snake doesn't pull away. After a moment of stiff surprise he actually relaxes and leans into the kiss, pushing Raiden back down against the dialysis table.

When they finally break apart Snake clears his throat wetly.

“S-sorry, I...”

Snake's face is a confused rictus for a moment, just long enough for Raiden to notice, before he quashes it down again. “S'fine,” he says gruffly, smoothing the now slightly frayed front of his shirt down. “Just... you shouldn't.”

Raiden's entire body is a mash of unfitting emotions— excitement, upset, anxiety— at the very least the heady rush of endorphins is almost as good as the painkillers.

“Shouldn't what?” He says. He suspects he knows exactly what but he wants to hear it right from Snake.

Snake turns away, balanced on the edge of the table as far away from Raiden as possible, and crosses his arms once again. His face, what Raiden can see of it, is cast in shadow and expressionless. “Shouldn't get too involved with me.”

“First of all, don't tell me how to feel,” Raiden spits, struggling to sit up a little and jamming a sharp hand against Snake's back as he does. “Second of all, you can't just decide when other people have had enough of you! You're—” he pauses to gasp for breath— “causing more pain by pushing people away than you would if you just— just let them help you die in peace, you miserable bastard—”

His tirade gets caught up in his throat and tumbles out as a coughing fit, a ragged pain tearing across his stomach and flaring out through the rest of the wounds across his body. Probably for the best— he knows he's crashed over more than a few lines, and he's already gone too far to reel himself in. It's over quickly but in the moment it takes for Raiden to catch his breath again Snake has already stood and turned, shoulders shaking with his own wheezing, and put his hands on Raiden's chest and stomach, holding him still. Trying to make sure he doesn't injure himself further.

After a heavy, silent moment, Snake says, “You telling me to grow up, kid?”

“Yes,” Raiden pouts, still breathless.

Snake actually laughs, light and careful so as not to start a coughing jag, hanging his head as he does. “You really have changed.”

Raiden squirms under Snake's heavy hands and looks away.

The hum of the engines overtakes the room again as they stand and lie in silence, Snake looking at the ground and Raiden at the ceiling. Finally, spurred by a shallow cough, Snake sits down again, placing one hand on his own knee and the other on the opposite side of Raiden, leaning over him. His eyes are running over the planes of Raiden's face the same way they ran over his body— slow, methodical. Raiden tells himself he's imagining that this time there's more warmth in the pale grey.

“Figures you're even stubborn about that.”

“I learned from the best.”

Snake laughs again, then rubs the back of his hand gently over his mouth and leans in.

Their second kiss is much more comfortable than the first, even though Raiden is surprised this time and the moustache is still distracting. The third is little more than a brush of lips as Snake leans away, eyes still fixed on Raiden's.

“Tell you what.”

Raiden can hardly breathe but he manages to squeak out a “what?”

“If you quit protecting me, I'll quit smoking.”

“I... can't promise that. You know I can't.”

Snake stands, sinking from the shoulders up into the shadow cast by the frame of the door. “Then I'll have to think about it.”

Raiden watches him leave, then directs his gaze to the ceiling once more. His heart is racing, probably enough to put strain on the dialysis machine, but he's still heavy with exhaustion. The deep hum of the Nomad's engines settles into the room again like a blanket, and soon enough his body has regulated itself, washed the stress and emotion out like so many unwanted stains. He sleeps, dreamless.

**Author's Note:**

> Commission fic for Ally~ Thank you so much to SinkingSea for the translation! ♥


End file.
